My solutions assume they keep the Radiance/Gloom and Hope/Dread mechanics in the game.

There are two ways that they could change how people acquire Radiance and actually increase player involvement in 3-man and 6-man dungeons.

First would be to change Radiance to a Deed. Say, for example, you get your first “rank” of Radiance from killing all or some the bosses of the 3-man instances. And then more “ranks” from killing other bosses in both 3-man and 6-mans or even some of the non-Radiance gated raids.

Positives:

It requires players who wish to raid to complete all the non-raid content. It creates a series of stepping stones of accomplishment – not grind – for the player to advance in a meaningful and logical way through game progression.

It requires players to run instances they might otherwise skip. If they dislike a particular instance, they will give the development team increased feedback because they are now required to do it. It’s a better check and balance on whether or not the instances are tuned properly and increases the likelihood of the developers actually making the necessary changes to the crappier instances.

It allows players to refocus on itemization and gives more customization for end-game players. It removes the focus from gear-based gating and acquiring specific pieces of gear and puts it more on finding the best combination of gear to suit your play style and current itemization.

Negatives:

Once you complete the Deed, the drive to run those instances will drop significantly. There would be a massive influx of instance running for these particular Deeds and then it would die down once more and more people have completed them.

You still have the problem of players needing to run very specific instances to get Radiance. These players will be less inclined to run other instances. They will be more inclined to run the one or two instances they need to finish the Deed.

The second way to fix the system would be to adjust the token and barter systems. For example, each boss of each 3-man instance would drop 1 token for everybody. Each boss of each 6-man instance would drop 2-3 tokens for everybody. Then, the token totals could be adjusted for difficulty. Say, the more difficult bosses drop 2 instead of 1 or 4 instead of 3. This creates incentives for running all of the instances in the game for everyone. The more challenging, longer instances reward more tokens. The easier, faster instances reward less tokens. Risk versus Reward.

Then there are two ways to go about a barter system. The first is the keep a modified version of the current tokens for gear system. Only obviously increase the amount of tokens per item and also put all of the items into this system. That way all the instances contribute to your acquisition of all the various items.

Positives:

It creates an incentive for all players to run all the various instances all the time. When the kinship is throwing together a run of instance X, everyone can use something from instance X, and everyone will get some progress toward their Radiance set. It increases player involvement in all instances across the board.

It reduces randomization and frustration on the part of the players who currently “lose the roll”. When the token(s) drop for everybody, everybody is happy.

You no longer need specific instances for progress. All instances contribute to progress all the time.

Negatives:

You are still required to have Radiance gear. You are still limited on gear customization and itemization.

You are still grinding a lot of instances. The variety may help, but it’s still a grind more than anything else.

Eventually, you will run out of items to spend your tokens on. So, in that regard, the tokens will need to purchase more than just Radiance pieces to give players incentive to run these instances after having acquired their Radiance pieces. Consumables are always a good bet, although the developers are hell-bent are giving you more and more crappy LIs through bartering.

Players will eventually find the one instance that gives the very best token to difficulty/time ratio and farm the living crap out of it. It is going to require some tuning by development to get the numbers just right as to discourage this sort of meta-game.

The other way is to have these tokens turn in for a trainable passive ability – Radiance. Turn in 50 tokens, earn rank 1 Radiance, each new rank requires you already know the previous rank, etc, etc. This moves Radiance off of gear while still requiring instance tokens instead of a Deed.

Positives:

Same as above. Incentive to run all the instances more often, reduced randomization and frustration, and removal of the necessity to run specific instances.

It moves Radiance off of gear and into a passive ability.It allows for more player itemization and gear customization.

Negatives:

Same as above. You are still grinding a lot of instances, you will eventually need something else worthwhile to spend tokens on, hardcore players will find the “best and fastest” route and exploit it, and it requires developer tuning.Except you no longer have Radiance on gear.